Not Goodbye
by Rainbowscape
Summary: Aeryn's leaving Moya and John has to cope. Post Season One. John/Aeryn


**DISCLAIMER:** Farscape belongs to Rockne S. O'Bannon, David Kemper, Jim Henson Productions, Hallmark Ent, Nine Network and Sci-Fi Channel. This is an independent fan work by a fan of the show not meant to infringe on the rights of these owners and for the purpose of entertainment only with no monetary gain.

**AUTHOR'S NOTE:** _Written after Season One, revised after seeing "Mind the Baby" because of similarities that inspired a change to the end of the story. (2002)  
_

**SPOILERS: **Nerve, THM, FT, MTB

**NOT GOODBYE**

**By Leah**

John Crichton sat at the table of the mess hall in stunned silence after hearing the proposal but the rest of the table buzzed to life.

"It seems to be the best plan of action," said D'argo.

"It would provide extra reassurance which, considering what happened with Crais, would be beneficial to all of us," said Zhaan.

"It was getting crowded around here," spoke Rygel. "And when you go...if there are any items you no longer have use for make sure I'm the first--'

Chiana slapped Rygel across the nose. "Quiet, Toad-boy. I can think of one item we already have no use for and if you don't shut up there are ways to get rid of it!"

Pilot's head appeared in the clam-shaped holoviewer. "Since his return, Talyn has been very confused and frightened. Moya would be grateful for anything you do to help."

Aeryn nodded. "Good. Then, we're all agreed. I'll begin moving my things over first thing tomorrow."

* * *

"Is something the matter, John?" Aeryn asked. She stood in the doorway of the mess hall and watched as he fiddled with a plate of untouched food cubes. Everyone else had long ago left the mess hall, and she was surprised to see he was still there when she had happened by in the hall. He was looking rather dark which may have been because he was wearing a black tee shirt and pants or because his face was so serious.

Oops, he thought. Now she's concerned about me. She called me John. He folded his hands and tried to look innocent. "Uh..." He hesitated as Aeryn came to sit across the table from him. "I'm alright. How 'bout you? Finished packing?"

Aeryn nodded. "Almost." She reached across the table and picked one of the food cubes from his plate. "Are you eating these or are you arranging them into pictures?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

John continued to stare at his plate and didn't answer.

A look of concentration spread across Aeryn's forehead. "You did this for me after the encounter with Namtar to make me feel better." She looked at the disordered pattern of cubes on his plate. "Are you trying to make yourself feel better?"

John sighed. "No." He paused. He wasn't fooling her. "Guess I was just lost in thought."

"About what?" She placed the cube in her mouth and chewed it. There was no need for unspoiled food cubes to go to waste, now was there?

"About how different things are gonna be...you moving to Talyn." He pushed his plate over to the middle of the table towards her for an easier reach.

Aeryn crinkled her brow. "How will they be different?" she asked in puzzlement. She picked up another cube from the plate. "I'll still be able to communicate with Moya and everyone else through the comms and fulfill all my tasks aboard Moya. I won't shirk in my duty," she added defensively.

"I didn't say you would," John replied, prickling. He really didn't want to get into an argument right now.

Aeryn bit into her food cube and chewed for a moment. She swallowed it and picked up still another. It was the last of the shiny green kind.

It reminded John of the first meal they had shared together on Moya while Zhaan and D'argo interrogated them about the Peacekeepers. He remembered how self-assured and arrogant she had been. How lost and amazed he had been. How they had formed an instant alliance based on a pilfered fork and escaped to the commerce planet together.

Aeryn raised both her eyebrows and fixed a straight-forward blue gaze on him. She slapped her hand on the table in front of her. "Then, what's the problem?"

"They'll be different." John shrugged, shaking himself from his reverie. He looked away from her. He couldn't explain himself any better. If he blurted anything out now, as jumbled up as his thoughts were, he was sure he'd end up sounding like an idiot. "That's all." And he was silent again.

Aeryn chewed another mouthful silently. She had put herself out trying to talk with him and, with no further encouragement; she didn't try to break the silence that fell into the air between them.

* * *

John walked through the winding corridors of Moya, swinging his arms at his sides, reaching out every so often to balance himself whenever the living ship made an unexpected shift. Many bumps and bruises had taught him to do this and now he did so automatically.

Aeryn had emptied his plate, clearly puzzled by his behavior and waiting to see if he would break the silence. Her usual complaint was that he talked too much but currently she was feeling exasperated because he wasn't talking at all now. What a time for me to turn over a new leaf, huh? John thought with a small inward smile, thinking how confused Aeryn would have been by that expression but his momentary mirth quickly faded away.

Aeryn was feeling annoyed with him now. She had stood up, sighed and gone, heading for the lab to receive a med kit Zhaan had suggested Aeryn take with her in case of emergencies.

Take with her, John thought. By the end of the day, Aeryn would be over on Talyn. Only a comm link away. The girl next door. It was no big deal. Right? This was the Uncharted Territories and now that Talyn was traveling with them there seemed to be no question that the hybrid was one more added reason for them to be pursued by the Peacekeepers or other unscrupulous characters who thought they might make a profit. Moya and Talyn had been separated once before. What if--

John found himself in the corridor just outside of Aeryn's quarters. He was about to walk on by when his cluttered brain realized that the door was open. "Pilot?" he spoke softly into his comm. He slowed to a halt just outside her door. "Where's Aeryn right now?"

Pilot must have been working on something extra for Aeryn's departure too for his response was not as prompt as usual, "Officer Sun is currently in the weapons bay."

John shook his head and smiled outwardly now. Just like the ex-Peacekeeper to make a side shopping trip there on the way to the pharmacy. But if Aeryn was there and she wasn't here then who was--

John stealthily moved into the doorway and peeked in. The occupant's back was to him.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" he barked at the top of his lungs, stepping into the room.

A pale blur leapt upwards over his head, springing to a cranny near the ceiling, then bouncing back towards the floor. With a quick twist, she managed to land on her feet and face him.

"What am I doing? What are you doing?" the startled Nebari girl, now recovering from the scare, flashed back at him. Her shock of white bangs fell over her eyes and her dark eyes looked defiant. "You shouldn't be so sneaky," she accused, sounding a little out of breath.

But then, she always sounded that way. John put his hands on his belt. He narrowed his eyes and began to circle her. "Okay, whatever you took, Pip--Put it back!"

"Look! I didn't steal anything!" Chiana cried out, sounding offended by the very accusation.

John kept making a half-circle in front of her, keeping himself between her and the door.

Chiana tilted her head, following his skeptical movements. "Okay. Well. It's not like I wouldn't if I could but you see," she confessed with all due seriousness but the words streamed out of her mouth with barely a pause between them. "Aeryn doesn't have anything worth stealing here. She took all her valuables with her to put on her Prowler. So, Crichton, I might have if I could have and wanted to but I don't want to and I can't so I won't. You see?" Her lips couldn't help curling into a smile after this brilliant argument for her defense.

"Uh huh," John licked his lip. Oddly enough, the young thief was actually making sense to him. He rubbed his chin. "Then, what are you doing here, Chi?"

"Well, you heard Ryg, today, didn't you?" Chiana's head bobbed from left tilt to right tilt as she watched him pace back and forth. "What's the first thing you think he'll do when Aeryn isn't here and he thinks he can get away with it?" Chiana reasoned.

"You have a point." John grinned. This was beginning to sound unbelievable. "So you're watchin' out for Aeryn's things?"

"Well, yeah. I mean--" Chiana looked embarrassed for a moment. "I mean, sort of. Why not? Aeryn's only going to live on Talyn temporarily, right? So, who do you think will get blamed if she comes back and finds her place has been trashed or something missing?"

John's eyes glittered with mirth and his mouth twitched, but he managed to stay serious.

He scratched his nose and then dropped his hands to his sides in a Superman pose. "I see, so you're protecting yourself."

"You better believe it," Chiana affirmed with a phrase borrowed directly from the mouth of John Crichton.

As hard as it was to admit, Chiana had proved invaluable in helping to save Aeryn's life during the mission on the gammack base. She had taken the life-giving nerve back to Moya while he had been stuck in a Peacekeeper cell at the beck and call of Scorpius and the Aurora Chair. For that at least, he owed Chiana the benefit of the doubt.

"Okay," John backed off and backed out of the room. He turned to leave as he reached the door and wished her well in the venture. "Knock yourself out."

Chiana kneeled on the floor, stretching and staring at the door through which the departing human had disappeared, with a questioning look upon her face. She tilted her head from side to side. "Now, why would I want to do an idiotic thing like that?"

* * *

"John?" Zhaan's soft voice called out to him as he lingered out in the hallway outside of Zhaan's lab.

He poked his head in the door and quickly scanned the room. Apparently, Aeryn had already finished her errand here and left. "Yeah?" He looked at Zhaan already guessing what he could expect. News spread around Moya like wild fire.

"Aeryn believes you aren't feeling well. Is there anything I can I do for you?"

John shrugged. His hands were in his pockets. "I don't know, Zhaan. It's just lately I've been looking at things. Wondering about them. I'll figure it out."

"What sort of things, John?" She sounded genuinely interested. Zhaan gestured for him to sit down on a curve of Moya's wall that jutted out and formed a bench. "Would you like to talk about it, my dear?"

"I guess I've just been trying to sort out all the wild and crazy stuff that goes on around here." John sidled into the room and sat down, resting his elbows on his knees, and curling his hands in front of him.

"Reflection is good, John," Zhaan approved. "It brings balance. Harmony. Eventually, one can be at peace with the universe."

"Yeah, maybe. Someday. But it stings like crazy at first."

"Part of life is pain, John," Zhaan replied.

John nodded. Pain. He'd seen and experienced enough of that sitting in Scorpius' chair. First, he'd lost Earth. His home planet that he might never see again. Then, he'd met strange aliens and visited stranger planets under the strangest of circumstances. In the past year--cycle, he corrected himself, he'd been ruthlessly pursued by Crais, had a worm stuck in his gut, been inhabited by a killer intellant virus, and now lost, Gilina, one of the few friends he'd made since his slingshot journey through the wormhole. These experiences had changed him forever. Even if he did find Earth now, his life would never be the same again.

And that hurt.

* * *

"Ah, Crichton," the huge Luxan greeted him as he entered the cargo bay. "Glad to see you're feeling better." D'argo's tentacles swung as he lifted a box and walked towards the Prowler.

"Uh, thanks," John replied, scratching the back of his neck and trying not to feel too guilty about not offering to help before this and also for not really being sick. Talking to Zhaan had helped him clear his head a little. "Anything I can do?"

"Almost finished here," Aeryn said from the Prowler as she took hold of the box that

D'argo handed up to her and stowed it away.

John had a good look around and whistled when he saw the assortment of items scattered and stacked about the cargo bay. "Wow! It looks like you're packing for a monen's vacation. Did you pack the kitchen sink?"

"I'm only bringing the essentials," Aeryn replied, stiffly. She alighted from the Prowler. With clenched teeth, she hoisted a crate above her head and moved it to the other side of the bay to set it on top of another one.

John didn't waste his breath trying to explain his phrase. "Then, what's all this stuff?" John asked, sweeping the bay with his arm. He noticed a bowl-like covered container nearby and helpfully picked it up.

"All 'this stuff'," Aeryn's tone was sharp. "Belongs to his Lowliness." She grabbed for another but smaller crate. "He apparently wished to use the cargo bay and my Prowler as his personal refuse deposit." She shared a look with D'argo. "An idea that will be remedied shortly."

John reached out to help her with the crate but Aeryn clutched it close. "The only thing left to load is my extra pulse rifle," she told him.

John held up his hands, still holding the bowl, and let her by. She had never allowed him to forget the mishap he had once had with one of her pulse rifles.

"Officer Sun," Pilot's voice came over their comms. "I would like to speak with you before your departure. In private."

"I'll be right there, Pilot," Aeryn replied, setting her load down. She gave John a piercing look and exited the bay.

"Why is she so annoyed with me?" John asked. "It's not my fault, Spanky went and--"

D'argo cleared his throat with significance.

John stopped and looked at him. "What? You think it's my fault? Tell me, how is it _my_ fault?" he challenged. He should have known better by now and not asked but the question had already left his mouth and D'argo proceeded to give him the answer.

"Apparently he got the idea from something you were talking about. Jump cleaning."

"Jump cleaning?" John repeated in bewilderment.

"Yes. Apparently a ritual performed on Earp where you rid yourself of items that you no longer have use for and--"

John snapped his fingers in comprehension. "D'argo, it's not jump. It's spring. Spring cleaning. I stubbed my toe on something that was in his room the other day and I shouted something about it," he explained. He looked curiously at the bowl--one of Rygel's possessions and then lifted the cover. He screwed up his face as a potent smell hit his nostrils and his eyes watered. He quickly snapped down the lid. "I'm not even going to ask what that is!"

"I'll take that," D'argo said, smugly and took the putrid smelling stuff from the disgusted human, slipping it into a bulging bag. D'argo put the bag on his shoulder then watched for a moment as John stood staring at the Prowler. He walked up beside his ally and friend. "I would have thought you would support Aeryn's decision. She is well aware of the risks she is taking. We need someone in control of Talyn. It is better than having no control at all. I will rest easier knowing she is there to warn us. It is good strategy, Crichton."

"Yeah, D'argo. Well, I'm not thrilled about the idea. That's all." He rubbed his temples and shook his head, putting uncalled for anger in his next words. "Is everyone my personal therapist all of a sudden because I didn't see any PhD's?"

D'argo stood contemplating him, looking as if he had said something to say, but was indecisive. He turned and went back to work.

John noticed the Luxan warrior was gathering up several other items. "Where you goin' with that, big guy?" John asked in an apologetic tone, already regretting his outburst.

"To find Rygel and return his refuse to him," D'argo replied. His tone told Crichton that D'argo wasn't holding anything against him. "It is a task that will give me great pleasure."

With a grin on his face that would have made the Hynerian run to hide in the deepest crevices and the farthest reaches of Moya if he had been there to see it, D'argo disappeared into the corridor.

John sighed and sat down on the abandoned crate.

Several microts later, Aeryn walked into the cargo bay, saw him, and walked on by. "Oh, are you still here?" she said, giving him the cold shoulder treatment. She strode past him with a tool in hand which resembled a wrench and bent to check something in the front of her Prowler.

"You're still upset with me," John observed. There was a measure of surprise in his voice.

Aeryn straightened. "Of course, I'm upset with you! You're upset. You don't want to tell me why. Why shouldn't I be upset?" She threw down her tool and walked towards the exit.

She had a point. Somehow, all the feelings he had had today swelled up inside of him and came to a fore. Moya had become his home now just as everyone on board, insane as they usually seemed, were people he cared about. And for even one of them to leave Moya--even temporarily--involved a risk. A risk of loss. Whipped to the surface, it came out, "You once said, when Talyn was with Crais, he shot at you!"

His words brought her to a halt in the middle the doorway. She pivoted, and then leaned against the frame of the doorway, looking back at him. Aeryn grimaced. She couldn't help but let the emotion enter her voice at the memory. "He's only a child. First, Moya left him and then he thought we all had. He was confused." She folded her arms across her chest and paused, reigning in her emotion, sadness and disappointment, over what had happened in the past. She pressed it all back with a slight shudder.

John stood up and moved slowly towards her. "I just can't shake this idea. If something happens--"

Aeryn locked her gaze with his. She had no patience for what-ifs. She spoke vehemently. "Things happen, Crichton! We all make mistakes. We learn from them." Aeryn's eyes traveled over his face for a moment. "We deal with them--and we move on!" She paused and the octave of her voice had returned to its normal level when she spoke again. "Pilot says this a sensitive time between Moya and Talyn but Talyn has expressed sorrow over his former actions. Forgive Talyn, John. I have."

A choking noise came out of John's throat and when he opened his mouth, Aeryn realized it was a chuckle. "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade," he quoted suddenly. "Where'd you get such a human idea, Aeryn Sun?"

Aeryn's face remained serious but her eyes were beaming. "I suppose it results from spending so much time with a certain human I know. Irreversible contamination."

John chuckled again softly and all the stress of day seemed to exhale from him with the apologetic sigh that followed. "I'm sorry," he said, giving her a lopsided grin. "I guess I was just wishing, with all these changes, there could be one constant. That somewhere in this mixed-up, crazy universe, something would always be the same. But I suppose that's almost too much to ask..." he trailed off. Then, he shook himself and moved on to a new thought. "So, would you like to come and eat lunch with this human tomorrow?"

The corners of her mouth twitched. "On one condition," she said with mock severity.

"Yeah?" John prompted.

"That I won't be the only one eating it," Aeryn said.

John took her hand in his and squeezed it gently. "You have a deal," he promised.

She didn't withdraw her hand. She intertwined her fingers with his. "There is one thing that will always be the same," she told him, softly.

"What's that?"

A radiant smile lit up her features doing credit to her surname, Sun. She raised her head to look at him. "You will always be John Crichton," she said, fondly.

John smiled. "And this won't be goodbye. It wasn't the last time or the time before that."

"It's not goodbye," Aeryn agreed.

Just before retiring, John took a solitary trip up to the terrace. He stood there for a moment gazing over at Talyn and began to reflect on a grand scale. Maybe one day he would find Earth again, but the importance of that faded away for a moment as he thought about his life on Moya with his shipmates....his friends...his _family_. It wasn't so hard to make lemons into lemonade when he really thought about it. Watching young Talyn and gazing at the distant stars, he felt almost as if he could reach out and touch the future, whatever it might bring.

"It's not goodbye," John repeated softly to himself.

* * *

_Reviews chase away the blues:)  
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